Author Archives: Greg C.

About Greg C.

I am passionate about building awesome user experiences, working closely with publishers and watching people "get" technology.

Open AIM Developer Contest Results

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When we launched Open AIM 2.0 in March we announced a contest being run through TopCoder that was part of the launch where AIM gave away $100,000 in prizes, and some t-shirts along the way. We saw dozens of really top notch submissions and judging them was no easy task.

Last week at the Top Coder Open in Las Vegas we announced the winners, the top 9 got to split the $10,000 each while 20 runners up got $500 each. Winning submissions ranged from whiteboarding plugins to an IM translation tool to a viral video sharing web site via web AIM APIs.

Here is the winners list:

  • IM Remote – Screen to screen desktop sharing over AIM.
  • IM Loud: This plugin reads IMs out loud to the user.
  • IM Whiteboard: Use AIM as a whiteboard and simultaneously draw with buddies.
  • LinkPreview: Thumbnail link previews when hovering over a link sent to you in chat.
  • Free2IM: Provides automatic, on-the-fly language translation back and forth over IM.
  • Infomess: Chat and share videos at the same time.
  • Share-A-Map: Share and collaboratively edit MapQuest maps. Giving someone directions will never be the same…
  • PopsChat: Bound to score points with TopCoder users, this plugin brings AIM chat and features to the TopCoder Arena (a chat and messaging area).
  • FeedReader: An RSS feedreader for AIM.

Congrats to all the winners. AOL is actively running a competition right now with TopCoder, this time for developers wanting to build video search applications via Truveo APIs.

AIM Express 7.0 Beta

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Today we are launching a new version of AIM Express. This version, 7.0 is a beta and is built on top of the Open AIM WimAS3 library that we released back in March as part of the Open AIM 2.0 announcement. This Adobe Flash based application allows you to use AIM any where you have an internet connection and not have to worry about downloading the full AIM 6.8 client.

As we posted on the beta website…

Although this application will work with most versions of Adobe® Flash® 9, we highly recommend you upgrade to the most recent version of Flash, as older versions have a serious security flaw. The upgrade is available here.

Check out AIM Express 7.0 Beta here.

Let us know what you think of AIM Express 7.

New TwitterMan for AIM 6.8 Beta

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I posted a new version of TwitterMan for AIM 6.8 Beta 3. This plugin was a collaboration between myself and one of my teammates, Gus.

This build will only work with the latest AIM 6.8 Beta or newer. For those unfamiliar with TwitterMan, this AIM plugin will set your status message on Twitter to the same status you have currently set on AIM. Recently Twitter added the ability to push your Twitter status to social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace, Blogger, and others. So now TwitterMan will be able to propagate your AIM status from AIM to Twitter then to Facebook for example. The latest version will securely store your Twitter credentials so you do not have to enter them every time you sign into AIM. The latest version appears at the bottom of your buddy list where you can log into Twitter and manage your settings.

We will be making some improvements over time, including getting alerts when your Twitter Friend Feed has changed.

AIM 6.8 Beta 3

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Its been a little while since I blogged about our AIM 6.8 Windows client, but its not been for the lack of us doing work on the client. We have been really hard at work building, in my opinion, the best AIM client to date. Here is a snapshot of changes…

Look for changes to the way we display plugins at the bottom of your Buddy List® window. We’ve pulled them out from behind the control panel and now you can access them with just a click on the icon. Don’t miss the following updates as well:

 

  • Click the Get More link and browse our Featured Developers, Most Downloaded, and Most Recently Update plugins
  • Slide the curtain up to view more plugins
  • Click the Manage link to de-activate, uninstall plugins
  • AIM Call Out is back in this version
  • New plugins! Single/multiplayer games, synch your AIM and Twitter status messages, list of your most frequent IM buddies and more

We have also taken the BL-Ops plugin I wrote almost 3 years ago that allowed you to import or export your buddy list to a file, and made this plugin as part of the client. All users can now export your buddy list to load it on a separate PC or to share it with your friends.

This is a really exciting release, and I will have a follow up post over the weekend about this release.

Download AIM 6.8 Beta 3 here.

AIM MusicLink Feedback

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I want to say thank you to all the people who have downloaded the latest AIM MusicLink version 2.2.0.0 and are using it every day. The uptake for the plugin has been really great, and I have to be honest this release has gone much better than earlier ones. I wanted to address some of the issues people have been having.

  • I have fixed the problem with the Songbird Extension for AIM MusicLink and you can download the extension here. Once you download the extension, please use Songbird to load the sbMusicLink.xpi file.
  • I have spent a few hours testing this version of AIM MusicLink with Windows Media Player 11 in just about every configuration possible and cannot reproduce any of the reports people have. All my WMP plugin does is listen to the current playing song and then writes to the Windows Registry if the player is playing and if so what is the current song. Then AIM MusicLink reads the registry key. These two keys can be found in HKCUSoftwareAIMAIMPluginsAIM MusicLinkWMPCurrentMedia and WMPIsPlaying. If you observe weird behavior with these keys please let me know.
  • The latest WinAMP version has been working for me.
  • The theory I have regarding those who have issues with players beyond iTunes working, is that make sure iTunes is truly closed. I have seen instances where I close iTunes yet it is not truly shutdown. AIM MusicLink will still think it sees iTunes opened and try to set the iTunes song not WinAmp or other player you are using. AIM MusicLink has a specific order of operations that it looks for music. The first player it finds music for, it will try to report the result, even if no song is loaded on the player in some cases. Here is the order that I use:
  1. iTunes
  2. WinAmp
  3. MediaMonkey
  4. Windows Media Player 9/10/11
  5. Yahoo Jukebox
  6. Songbird
  7. RealPlayer

Please make sure if you are seeing issues where AIM MusicLink is reporting an incorrect or unexpected result, check the above list and make sure that a player is not accidentally loaded that you think you closed. As always I appreciate all the feedback, and keep it coming so I can make sure AIM MusicLink continues to be the top AIM Plugin.

Schmap on the iPhone

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A post on TechCrunch caught my attention this morning. Schmap is launching their city guides for the iPhone and iPodTouch. These free travel guides are a nice way to get info on a city online or offline. As readers of this blog know, I travel a lot to meet with developers who are building Open AIM applications and to evangelize Open AIM. Schmap city guides can be browsed online or offline, so before I get onto the plane I usually download Schmap so I can browse a city guide in flight. Schmap caught my attention last year when they asked to use one of my photos on Flickr that I took during W3C for their city guide for Calgary. If you are doing a lot of travel this summer, check out Schmap as an alternative or supplement to TripAdvisor or other online travel sites.

PS – Here is the photo that Schmap used from my Calgary collection:

AOL on Desktop for the Mac

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It has been an eternity (well more like 5 years), but we have released a new AOL client for the Mac. The client will run on both MacTel and PPC for Leopard and Tiger.

So far the reviews have been very good for this application, so if you are a long time AOL user on the Mac check out the latest build.

http://macblog.aol.com/media/ADM-FullWidthFlyout.jpg

One thing about this client that is worth pointing out is the buddy list and IM functionality in the client is powered by the Open AIM Mac SDK. The Mac SDK contains framework for applications to be written using Cocoa. This framework is the same that powers our experimental AIM Lite client for the Mac that we released in January of this year. You can view the source for this experimental client in the Mac SDK. We are starting to see more applications being written for platforms other than Windows which is really exciting.

I know the AOL Mac team would love to have some feedback on their work. They have a blog where you can keep up with the latest info and where you can share your thoughts on the client.

Calling Out on Mother’s Day

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This Sunday is Mother’s Day and whether you celebrate the holiday with Mom or not, today is a great time to call Mom and say, “thanks for putting up with me all these years!” AIM Call Out is giving out free calls from Saturday May 10th at 6AM EDT to Monday May 12th at 4AM EDT so that way you can give mom or even grandma a call to say Happy Mother’s Day. The catch is that you have to add $5 to your AIM Call Out account, after the weekend, all $5 will still be there for you to use. Just make sure you are using AIM 6.5 or better or if you do not have AIM installed you can use AIM Call Out Web Connect.

In other AIM Call Out news, last week we launched Open Voice APIs. Open Voice allows AIM® Call Out customers to use a third-party software client or hardware device with their AIM Call Out account by providing a generally available SIP Gateway. The AOL Voice team has successfully used the AIM Call SIP Gateway with the following devices:

Softphones:

  • X-Lite (Version 3.0)
  • PhonerLite (version 1.43)

The two limitations right now is that we do not allow SIP client registration for inbound calling, nor does this service do pc-2-pc calling, this can be done via the Open AIM APIs with the Windows or Linux SDK.

AIM MusicLink version 2.2.0.0

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I am posting a new AIM MusicLink tonight based on feedback from all my users. I have fixed a long standing bug with the MediaMonkey player, so for those of you using MediaMonkey for your media player needs, you will now see status updates.

I have also added support to insert a music note in your status message when using AIM MusicLink. Here is an image of the new music note support.

AIM MusicLink is an Open AIM plugin, it sets your status and profile message to your current playing song on 7 different media players. I support WinAmp, iTunes, Windows Media Player, Yahoo Jukebox, Songbird, RealPlayer, and MediaMonkey. AIM MusicLink also logs the songs that you play and stores them in a log where you can view what you have been listening to all week. To get started with AIM MusicLink just download the exe, exit AIM, and install AIM MusicLink. Re-start AIM, and listen to your favorite music. If you want to change and of the preferences, they can be found in the Actions menu at the bottom of the AIM buddy list.

I want to thank everyone for their feedback, AIM MusicLink depends on your feedback for new features and bug fixes. AIM MusicLink is the most popular download on the AIM Gallery and one of the most popular AIM plugins of all time, so it goes without saying, thanks for all the support. 🙂

Download AIM MusicLink version 2.2.0.0 here.

Open AIM Web Site Updates

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We updated the Open AIM development website today based on some feedback from developers as well as to correct two minor bugs with our source code samples. The big addition is to post our Visual Basic custom client sample to the web page. You can now view how to build a VB custom client and how to implement preferences, send IMs, view Buddy Profiles and more.

The other change we made was to our technotes for Buddy Info and seemless sign on to expressions and AIM startpage URLs.

As always we appreciate the feedback on our development website so please share what we can make better below. If there are specific samples people are looking for we can add them as well.